(September 14, 1937)
To Bo [Gu], Ye [Jianying], and Zhou [Enlai], and for the information of Lin [Boqu],
Dong [Biwu], Zhu [De], Peng [Dehuai], and Ren [Bishi]:

Regarding the question of the united front in every border region:
1. It is completely wrong for the representatives sent to the negotiations in
Wuhan by Fu Qiutao and others of the Hunan-Hubei-Jiangxi border area¹ to accept many disadvantageous conditions, such as allowing the field headquarters in
Wuhan to send directors of military supplies and directors of aides-de-camp to our
troops. We have telegraphed Boqu and Biwu to tell the representatives to the negotiations to cease negotiating and come back immediately. Fu Qiutao should
send other representatives, repudiate the conditions which have been agreed upon,
make new rules, and firmly adhere to the following points:
a. The Guomindang may not send a single person into our ranks;
b. The amount of the soldiers' pay and provisions should be fixed;
c. Set up camps in the mountainous regions where there are natural barriers that
can be defended, be strictly on guard against secret attacks and sabotage, and
do not ask to be stationed in big places.
2. Has Zheng Weisan met yet with Bo and Ye since he went to Nanjing? Please
ask Bo to tell Zheng Weisan to stick strictly to the aforementioned three points in
the Hubei-Henan-Anhui negotiations. In the future, Henan and the other regions
should not repeat the mistakes of the Hunan-Hubei-Jiangxi and Fujian-Guangdong
border areas.

3. Ask Nanjing to order Yu Hanmu² to return the personnel as well as the weapons of He Ming's troops;³ not a single person or weapon should be missing. How
are Bo and Ye's negotiations going?
4. In the united front, a local Party can easily fall into right opportunism. This
has already become the principal danger for the Party; please pay close attention
to it.

Luo Fu [Zhang Wentian]
[Mao] Zedong

--- Notes

Our source for this text is Mao Zedong wenji, Vol. 2, pp. 13-14, where it is reproduced from
a copy in the Central Archives.

1. Fu Qiutao (1907-1981) was at this time secretary of the Special Committee of the
Chinese Communist Party for the border area in question.

2. Yu Hanmu (1897-1981), a native of Guangdong, was at this time deputy commander
of the Guomindang's Fourth War Zone.

3. He Ming (1910-1939), a native of Guangdong, was at this time the commander and
political commissar of the South Fujian Third Independent Regiment. In July, the Guomindang
had surrounded and disarmed approximately a thousand of his men.